EU satiety project confronts growing obesity crisis

The new 6 million euro, EU backed satiety project will have a legacy long beyond its time-frame, as the collaborative effort looks to change the way the European market deals with the obesity crisis it faces.

Weight management and satiety modification are important areas for food and supplement manufacturers, but currently there are very few products backed by solid science.

The newly formed, EU funded, SATIN project aims to change this by combining research from top European universities with knowledge from some of Europe’s big industry players and innovations from smaller scale SME businesses.

Speaking with NutraIngredients, SATIN co-ordinator Professor Jason Halford said the project is ‘unique’ because it is “very much an industry driven project.”

“Here our goal is commercialising products … Either to get products to the point of commercialisation, or to start the commercialisation itself.”

The project – which boasts big name members including Coca-Cola, Cargill, Naturex, and NIZ, in addition to members from a sub-committee of the European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA) health claims panel – also integrates “advanced technologies” from smaller businesses (SMEs), which form a vital part of the project.

Collaboration

Because the project has such a commercial end point, Halford did note that commercial issues could have the potential to become difficult – especially when negotiating the different needs of all of the members of the group.

“But, what is important is that our partners know that they can achieve more from within SATIN than they could ever do on their own.”

Halford says that the platform will work well to help all of industry, including manufacturers, academia, contract researchers, analysis labs, “to really start working together and build functional collaborations.”

“Our primary aim is to produce products that have validated health claims for the consumer,” said Halford.

“On a broader process, we want to contribute to the reformulation of the diet of the European consumer – which is part of what industry is having to do to address the obesity crisis within Europe.”

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The new 6 million euro, EU backed satiety project will have a legacy long beyond its time-frame, as the collaborative effort looks to change the way the European market deals with the obesity crisis it faces.